Poetry

Toothbrush!
He’s using my toothbrush.
Old, smelly, yellow-teeth is using my toothbrush.
Doesn’t he know that the scraggly mint-green toothbrush is his?

“Well yours is green, too,” he tells me.
Army, khaki, fatigue green is NOT mint green
Fresh, smooth, cream-colored bristles are not crinkly, white strands of fiber.
Brothers! They think they’re SO great but mine is a disgusting old curmudgeon.
Three years older than me, he thinks he can push me around.

He grins at my fury
as I see him brushing my toothbrush
over his yellow teeth,

Is it catchy?
He says he’s been using it a long time.
Are my teeth going to turn ugly and yellow, too?
“Mom. Get me a new toothbrush, now.”

“I don’t have time to go to the store today,”

“But he’s using my toothbrush!
Hmmm… I just won’t brush my teeth until you get me another one.
You wouldn’t either if it was yours.”

My kayak paddle cuts a smooth surface. Blades of tall grass bend from a hillside, reach for the water below. A bull moose wades over pebbles; we watch a blue heron stalk through reeds.

dragonflies shimmer
in rays of an orange sun
painted turtle basks

I press on to deeper water. Grey stone bottom moves along beneath my craft. The wail of a loon slices heavy air as she calls to her mate. The tail of a trout protrudes from the beak of the father as he faces two bobbing brown offspring.